Bodies of Work

Celebrities seem to have it so easy, with their scrum of assistants, agents, managers, stylists, pool boys, spiritual advisors, and dialect coaches. Yet for all their hired help, there's still one thing they have to do for themselves: exercise. "Heidi Klum always jokes that if she could pay someone to work out for her, she definitely would," says her longtime trainer, David Kirsch.

But alas, Klum can't—nor can any of us. So celebrities shell out big bucks for intense one-on-one training. We asked the men and women who count off their crunches to reveal their most useful advice—the tricks they employ to keep their prized clients in prime shape and get them to the point where "working out is like brushing their teeth: It's not a decision, it's automatic," says Tracy Anderson, whose clients include Madonna and Gwyneth Paltrow. The same habits will work for those of us who still have to carry our own gym bags.

BECOME A MORNING PERSON

It can be hard to motivate early in the morning, but often it's the only stretch of free time for exercise. No one knows this more than overbooked celebrities. "Sometimes, when I was working with Jennifer Garner, we started at 4 a.m.," says Los Angeles personal trainer Valerie Waters. "We'd get there and nod at each other, she'd get on the treadmill...and about ten minutes later, we'd finally be like, 'Good morning.'"

As anyone who has ever set the alarm for 6:15 only to hit snooze nine times knows, the most arduous part of morning workouts is getting out of bed. To that end, Waters suggests a few tricks: Put your alarm clock across the room. Stack your workout clothes on your sneakers right next to your bed. Leave your makeup bag in your gym locker so you can't get ready for the office without it.

Yes, switching your schedule will be a challenge, but as Anderson says, "You can train yourself to work out at any hour. It just takes commitment and repetition. The most important thing is consistency." And Waters, for her part, points out that "the first four days or so, you may be like, Oh, my God, what am I doing? But once you work out in the morning, you're always happy you did." While Garner benefited from daybreak cardio sessions because they loosened and warmed her up for stunts on various television and movie sets, Waters says there's a civilian-life equivalent: "You get to the office and hit the ground running"—and you don't have to worry about something getting in the way of your evening workout, either.

LEARN NEW TRICKS

Doing the same thing day in and day out—be it the mindless half-hour on the treadmill or the rote-as-the-rosary 200 crunches (and nothing else)—can be as counterproductive as it is deathly dull. Los Angeles trainer Harley Pasternak, who works with Katherine Heigl and Alicia Keys, has a system that entails five five-minute phases of full-tilt intensity, starting with a warm-up on a cardio machine or with a jumping rope, then continuing with a series of upper-body strength moves, some lower-body exercises, core conditioning, and then a bit more cardio to finish. With each visit to the gym, the exact exercises within the five-minute intervals change, making the whole thing pretty rutproof.